Tag: Bitcoin

Two of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world, Coinbase and Bitfinex, have simultaneously announced their support of Segregated Witness (SegWit) protocols. The launch promises Bitcoin investors faster transaction times and lower transactions fees, which have recently dropped from over …

Two of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges in the world, Coinbase and Bitfinex, have simultaneously announced their support of Segregated Witness (SegWit) protocols. The launch promises Bitcoin investors faster transaction times and lower transactions fees, which have recently dropped from over $35 to less than $1.

Highly popular trading platform Bitfinex announced the implementation via Medium:

“Today Bitfinex is delighted to announce support for bitcoin deposit and withdrawals using P2SH Segregated Witness (SegWit) addresses… The SegWit implementation means Bitfinex users can benefit from lower BTC withdrawal fees (approximately 15%) and improved processing times on transactions across the Bitcoin network.

Bitfinex noted in the announcement that SegWit is now implemented for Bitcoin only, and not for Bitcoin Cash. This is an important distinction, as any Bitcoin Cash sent to a Bitfinex SegWit address will be lost. The Bitfinex platform processes more than $1 billion in daily trading volume, and is one of the largest exchanges by volume online.

Bitfinex CEO Paolo Ardoino released a statement on the implementation:

“SegWit provides not only an immediate benefit for users, but also a foundation for future Bitcoin development. By supporting SegWit addresses, Bitfinex is tackling three of the biggest crypto-enthusiast concerns: transaction fees, transaction speed, and total network capacity.”

Coinbase has not yet completed the rollout of SegWit, announcing a phased implementation over the next week with a 100% launch finalized by the end of February:

Our engineering team has finished testing of SegWit for Bitcoin on Coinbase.

We will be starting a phased launch to customers over the next few days and are targeting a 100% launch to all customers by mid next week.

Wait — What’s SegWit?

For the uninitiated, SegWit (Segregated Witness) is a solution to the Bitcoin scalability problem. Block sizes on the Bitcoin blockchain are limited to 1 MB. This limits the number of transactions that can be processed on the Bitcoin blockchain to between 5 and 7 transactions per second. Bitcoin’s block size limit has caused significant issues over recent months as user adoption rates increase, with transaction fees inflating to over $35 and transactions taking days to process.

Bitcoin Cash, a “hard fork” of the Bitcoin blockchain, was created on August 1, 2017, and was designed to solve the scalability problem by increasing the block size to 8 MB, thereby speeding up transaction processing rates and lowering fees.

The SegWit solution, however, is more of a “hack” than a complete solution to the issue. SegWit works around block size by splitting a transaction into two segments—appending signature, or “witness” data from the original transaction and attaching it.

An End to High Transaction Fees

Bitfinex and Coinbase, together with Coinbase’s GDAX exchange, account for almost 10% of all international Bitcoin trades, with both platforms ranked in the top 10 exchanges worldwide. Although many wallet solutions already support SegWit, the integration of the solution by two of the biggest industry players is likely to spark increased adoption of the workaround.

Bitcoin median fees from October courtesy of BitInfoCharts.

The announcements follow the release of the latest major Bitcoin Core Client update, which includes, for the first time, full SegWit support. SegWit adoption isn’t the only factor driving down Bitcoin transaction costs, however. A reduction in user activity has recently seen Bitcoin transaction fees drop significantly from over $35 to under $1.

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Bitcoin Gold logo Bitcoin Gold (CURRENCY:BTG) traded down 2.3% against the U.S. dollar during the 1-day period ending at 23:00 PM E.T. on January 30th. One Bitcoin Gold coin can currently be purchased for approximately $126.95 or 0.01181600 BTC on popular cryptocurrency exchanges …

Bitcoin Gold (CURRENCY:BTG) traded down 2.3% against the U.S. dollar during the 1-day period ending at 23:00 PM E.T. on January 30th. One Bitcoin Gold coin can currently be purchased for approximately $126.95 or 0.01181600 BTC on popular cryptocurrency exchanges including Fisco, Bitcoin Indonesia, GetBTC and Upbit. Bitcoin Gold has a total market cap of $2.14 billion and approximately $41.16 million worth of Bitcoin Gold was traded on exchanges in the last day. Over the last week, Bitcoin Gold has traded down 2.3% against the U.S. dollar.

Here is how related cryptocurrencies have performed over the last day:

Zcash (ZEC) traded 4.4% higher against the dollar and now trades at $444.63 or 0.04138470 BTC.

ZClassic (ZCL) traded 4.5% lower against the dollar and now trades at $148.46 or 0.01381800 BTC.

Komodo (KMD) traded 6.6% lower against the dollar and now trades at $4.53 or 0.00042123 BTC.

ZenCash (ZEN) traded up 5.6% against the dollar and now trades at $37.76 or 0.00353503 BTC.

Hush (HUSH) traded 5.8% lower against the dollar and now trades at $2.14 or 0.00019999 BTC.

Zero (ZER) traded 1.8% higher against the dollar and now trades at $1.73 or 0.00016237 BTC.

About Bitcoin Gold

BTG is a proof-of-work (PoW) coin that uses the Equihash hashing algorithm. It was first traded on October 25th, 2017. Bitcoin Gold’s total supply is 16,939,324 coins and its circulating supply is 16,839,324 coins. Bitcoin Gold’s official Twitter account is @bitcoingold and its Facebook page is accessible here. The Reddit community for Bitcoin Gold is /r/bitcoin and the currency’s Github account can be viewed here. Bitcoin Gold’s official website is bitcoin.org. The official message board for Bitcoin Gold is bitcointalk.org.

According to CryptoCompare, “Bitcoin Gold is a fork of the Bitcoin blockchain that occurred at block 491407. It implements a new PoW algorithm, Equihash, which makes it ASIC-resistant and can only be mined by GPUs rigs. The purpose of Bitcoin Gold is to make mining decentralized again following Satoshi Nakamoto’s vision of “1 CPU = 1 vote”. “

Stellar logo Stellar (CURRENCY:XLM) traded up 1.7% against the US dollar during the 1-day period ending at 23:00 PM ET on January 30th. During the last week, Stellar has traded down 11.4% against the US dollar. Stellar has a market cap of $7.46 billion and approximately $118.14 million worth of …

Stellar (CURRENCY:XLM) traded up 1.7% against the US dollar during the 1-day period ending at 23:00 PM ET on January 30th. During the last week, Stellar has traded down 11.4% against the US dollar. Stellar has a market cap of $7.46 billion and approximately $118.14 million worth of Stellar was traded on exchanges in the last 24 hours. One Stellar coin can now be bought for approximately $0.40 or 0.00003759 BTC on exchanges including Kraken, Bitcoin Indonesia, Qryptos and Poloniex.

Here’s how similar cryptocurrencies have performed during the last 24 hours:

Ripple (XRP) traded 2.8% lower against the dollar and now trades at $1.03 or 0.00009618 BTC.

NEO (NEO) traded down 3% against the dollar and now trades at $122.68 or 0.01141880 BTC.

IOTA (MIOTA) traded 2.9% lower against the dollar and now trades at $1.79 or 0.00016619 BTC.

TRON (TRX) traded down 0.4% against the dollar and now trades at $0.0455 or 0.00000423 BTC.

VeChain (VEN) traded 0.9% lower against the dollar and now trades at $6.13 or 0.00057067 BTC.

Tether (USDT) traded up 0.5% against the dollar and now trades at $1.00 or 0.00009352 BTC.

Populous (PPT) traded up 8.2% against the dollar and now trades at $26.59 or 0.00247503 BTC.

Binance Coin (BNB) traded 2.3% lower against the dollar and now trades at $9.62 or 0.00089542 BTC.

RChain (RHOC) traded down 6.3% against the dollar and now trades at $2.16 or 0.00020143 BTC.

Status (SNT) traded 0.5% lower against the dollar and now trades at $0.20 or 0.00001861 BTC.

Stellar Profile

Stellar was first traded on July 19th, 2013. Stellar’s total supply is 103,708,899,665 coins and its circulating supply is 18,467,791,230 coins. The Reddit community for Stellar is /r/stellar and the currency’s Github account can be viewed here. Stellar’s official Twitter account is @stellarorg and its Facebook page is accessible here. The official website for Stellar is www.stellar.org. Stellar’s official message board is stellarcommunity.org.

According to CryptoCompare, “Stellar is public infrastructure for money. Supported by a nonprofit, Stellar brings the world together by increasing interoperability between diverse financial systems and currencies. Stellar is a technology that enables money to move directly between people, companies and financial institutions as easily as email. This means more access for individuals, lower costs for banks, and more revenue for businesses. Help better the world’s financial infrastructure by participating in our community or by building on Stellar. “

Buying and Selling Stellar

Stellar can be traded on the following cryptocurrency exchanges: BCEX, Qryptos, Binance, Poloniex, Gatehub, Kraken, Bitcoin Indonesia, OKEx, Bitstamp (Ripple Gateway), Bittrex, Upbit, Stellar Decentralized Exchange, AEX, Exrates, Mr. Exchange, CoinEgg, RippleFox and GOPAX. It is not possible to purchase Stellar directly using U.S. dollars. Investors seeking to trade Stellar must first purchase Bitcoin or Ethereum using an exchange that deals in U.S. dollars such as Changelly, Gemini or GDAX. Investors can then use their newly-acquired Bitcoin or Ethereum to purchase Stellar using one of the exchanges listed above.

Infinity Economics (CURRENCY:XIN) traded up 7.3% against the U.S. dollar during the 24 hour period ending at 22:00 PM ET on January 30th. One Infinity Economics coin can now be purchased for $0.0209 or 0.00000195 BTC on cryptocurrency exchanges. Over the last seven days, Infinity Economics …

Infinity Economics (CURRENCY:XIN) traded up 7.3% against the U.S. dollar during the 24 hour period ending at 22:00 PM ET on January 30th. One Infinity Economics coin can now be purchased for $0.0209 or 0.00000195 BTC on cryptocurrency exchanges. Over the last seven days, Infinity Economics has traded up 47% against the U.S. dollar. Infinity Economics has a total market capitalization of $0.00 and approximately $173,008.00 worth of Infinity Economics was traded on exchanges in the last day.

Here’s how similar cryptocurrencies have performed over the last day:

Bitcoin (BTC) traded 2.3% lower against the dollar and now trades at $10,913.90 or 1.00000000 BTC.

Bitcoin Cash (BCH) traded 4.4% lower against the dollar and now trades at $1,337.24 or 0.12459400 BTC.

Steem (STEEM) traded down 4.7% against the dollar and now trades at $3.84 or 0.00035736 BTC.

Emercoin (EMC) traded 1.2% higher against the dollar and now trades at $4.59 or 0.00042738 BTC.

Experience Points (XP) traded 6% lower against the dollar and now trades at $0.0007 or 0.00000006 BTC.

BitcoinDark (BTCD) traded 5.6% lower against the dollar and now trades at $107.00 or 0.01000160 BTC.

Peercoin (PPC) traded down 2.8% against the dollar and now trades at $3.63 or 0.00033975 BTC.

PACcoin (PAC) traded down 2.9% against the dollar and now trades at $0.0000 or 0.00000000 BTC.

Counterparty (XCP) traded 0.1% higher against the dollar and now trades at $27.18 or 0.00254057 BTC.

BitBean (BITB) traded down 1.5% against the dollar and now trades at $0.0255 or 0.00000172 BTC.

Infinity Economics can be bought or sold on these cryptocurrency exchanges: . It is not possible to purchase Infinity Economics directly using US dollars. Investors seeking to trade Infinity Economics must first purchase Bitcoin or Ethereum using an exchange that deals in US dollars such as Gemini, Changelly or GDAX. Investors can then use their newly-acquired Bitcoin or Ethereum to purchase Infinity Economics using one of the aforementioned exchanges.

CO, Jakarta – Bank Indonesia (BI) once again released a public announcement regarding virtual currencies such as Bitcoin that are not considered to be a legitimate payment tool in Indonesia. In accordance with Law, No 7/2011 on currencies state that legitimate currencies are the ones that are issued …

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta – Bank Indonesia (BI) once again released a public announcement regarding virtual currencies such as Bitcoin that are not considered to be a legitimate payment tool in Indonesia.

In accordance with Law, No 7/2011 on currencies state that legitimate currencies are the ones that are issued by the country and that every transaction must use Rupiah as its currency.

“This makes it clear that virtual currencies are not included in the rupiah currency definition. That is why Bank Indonesia banned its use in Indonesia,” said Bambang Pramasudi, Head of Bank Indonesia’s branch office in Maluku Province on Tuesday, February 20.

Bambang reasoned that virtual currencies are saturated by risks, speculations, and fluctuates easily because of the lack of any official administrator that is responsible for controlling the value of the currency.

He also argued that virtual currencies are prone to be used for money laundering and source funds for terrorist activities.

Bambang once again reminds that Bank Indonesia has banned the use of virtual currencies such as Bitcoin by Indonesian payment system providers and financial technology organizers.